Margaret Atwood: Hurrah for World Book Night!

Giving away a story is an act of trust, says the novelist Margaret Atwood.

Novelist Margaret AtwoodPhoto: Marco Secchi/Getty Images

By Margaret Atwood

10:35AM GMT 04 Mar 2011

A long time ago I was in Barcelona, visiting my Catalonian publishers. I learnt the answers to many questions during that stay – for instance, why does Dalí have so many pictures of folks with lobsters on their heads? (Think about it, but not too intently. What is a long shape and turns red when heated?)

One day, I was walking around the Ramblas, the central tree-lined pedestrian mall where people love to stroll in the cool of the evening. Why were there so many bookstands? I wondered. Why were there so many florists? And why were people lined up at both, and dashing hither and thither with books and roses?

Ah, said my Catalonian minder. It was St George’s Day, and on that day every man gives a woman in his life a rose, in honour of the chivalrous, dragon-slaying, maiden-rescuing Saint; and every woman gives a man in her life a book, in honour of Cervantes – the creator of the melancholy and possibly delusional Don Quixote – who died on that date, as did Shakespeare.

More books were bought in Barcelona on St George’s Day than on any other day of the year. From that conjunction – two romantics, a successful knight and an unsuccessful though idealistic one – sprang Unesco’s World Book and Copyright Day, with many a bookish celebration, coupon purchase and website sporting images of what dancing librarians might look like if they danced.

Now we are seeing the first UK and Ireland World Book Night, an even more Quixotic venture. What windmill-tilter could have dreamt it up – the idea of arranging a mammoth event whereby a million – a million! – paper books would not be bought by the chivalrous and presented to loved ones but simply given away, all within the space of a few hours?

Don Quixote is famous for seeing things not as they are but as they should be, and World Book Night’s visionary, Jamie Byng of Canongate, partakes of his nature. Jamie is very much of the build-it-and-they-will-come persuasion, and so, via a smart website, a lot of help from his friends, and much fast talking to publishers, bookshops, libraries and authors (for authors must forego their royalties on the books that are given away), he built it.

I have to admit that when Jamie broke the idea to me, in early September, I thought he was a little crazy. But who am I to say a giant is only a windmill? I was the one who sensibly proclaimed, back in 1963, that grisly tinned rice pudding would never sell. How wrong I was! So I agreed with alacrity to be a patron of World Book Night. (It’s odd being a patron, but it would be odder to be a matron, so I guess the name stays.)

I didn’t think I would be able to attend the actual ceremonies, being from North America and all, and so, via Twitter, I invited those who were choosing to be book donors to be Me for a Day, and to give whatever book from the list they might desire. We conferred about the Margaret outfit – black with a pink scarf, white fright wig, drag allowed – and the shoes – flat, with a kitten heel – and the manner of walking – nose forward, scuttle a bit – and I and my surrogates were all set.

That offer still stands, though it seems I’ll be at the South Bank tonight after all. I, too, will wear the black outfit and the flat shoes, and you won’t be able to tell me apart from the other Margarets. I, too, will be giving books away and watching others give mine away. I expect to enjoy it, in a way I would not expect to enjoy, for instance, an event in which we were all giving away a million toasters.

But what is it that makes books things people love to give? Perhaps it’s because they’re so personal. “Tell me what you like and I will tell you who you are,” John Ruskin famously once said, and it’s true. We are what we eat, but we are also what we read.

Many a pick-up has been made through books – I know this because men shamefacedly tell me they’ve pretended to read my books in order to strike up relationships with ladies – and many a partnership has gone down in flames over the issue of what the significant other has been stuffing into his or her head via the printed page. So when we give someone a book, we are also delivering a complex message. It may be: “I love this book and I love you enough to share it with you.” It may be, a little more bossily: “You need to read this.” It may be: “I understand you and know you will like this.” It may be: “I respect you.” It may just be: “I see you.”

Books are frozen voices, in the same way that musical scores are frozen music. The score is a way of transmitting the music to someone who can play it, releasing it into the air where it can once more be heard. And the black alphabet marks on the page represent words that were once spoken, if only in the writer’s head. They lie there inert until a reader comes along and transforms the letters into living sounds. The reader is the musician of the book: each reader may read the same text, just as each violinist plays the same piece, but each interpretation is different.

So when you give a well-loved book to someone else, it is above all an act of trust: you are trusting the recipient not to massacre the book in his or her interpretation of it. Tonight , therefore, we will be witnessing not only a million Quixotic acts of giving, but a million Quixotic acts of trust.

“Go, little book,” authors used to tell their creations, in the end-of-the-book convention called the envoi . “Into the hands of strangers I confide you.” And when we give away a book we have loved, this is what we ourselves are thinking: Farewell, we wish the book. May your new owners treat you well; may they not throw you against the wall or use you for kindling. May they pardon your faults and praise your virtues. May you bring wisdom or knowledge. May you bring joy.

The World Book Night Party takes place tonight, 8pm-11pm at the Clore Ballroom, Royal Festival Hall, London SE1. Admission free. www.worldbooknight.org